


Amour Propre

by DescriptivePessimism_DAA



Series: Making Friends; How To [4]
Category: Magic Kaito, 名探偵コナン | Detective Conan | Case Closed
Genre: A whole lot of time-skips., Cause none of the warnings applied, Gen, I'll add the other tags as I go, I'm posting this ahead instead of bulk cause I'm impatient, Main Character Bullying, PTSD - of sorts, Yes; this is alt!Shin'ichi, also—main character kidnapping., before any of you ask, lost opportunities, refer to Ad Nauseam and En Famille, this is the alternate dimension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-22
Packaged: 2020-09-06 21:46:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,345
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20298439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DescriptivePessimism_DAA/pseuds/DescriptivePessimism_DAA
Summary: One should always be loved and respected and cared for, if not, that opportunity will wither away like sand through the gaps of one's fingers."If they couldn't appreciate him as he is, he's better off without friends."Shin'ichi swears to himself, and with that in mind, he hopes to survive this school year with the class that started this all... that he can go through without any mishaps, andnext yearhe'll make sure something like this wouldn't happen again.Who needed friends anyway?





	1. Compassion

(From One to Another)

  
Shin’ichi slowly breathes out, willing himself to keep calm, trying to convince himself—that he wasn’t feeling claustrophobic by how stares seem to drill ghostly, judgmental stares into the back of his head, making his hair prick and raise in anticipation. Adrenaline rising in response to his anxiety and triggering a flight reaction, and forcing himself to relax, he hurriedly stuffs his things inside his school bag—

He had not expected _Ran_—_Mouri, and Suzuki_—of all people to end up in the same class as him for the first time in high school as second years. It was easier to avoid them back in elementary, especially since he was home-schooled due to certain circumstances up until his first year in middle school, spending the second year in New York and third back in Japan. However, due to their ridiculously advanced early-enrollment his parents did, he was able to be in the first class—which was just a door away from Mouri and Suzuki’s class.

It was the same for first-year high school after middle school—wherein he rarely saw them and only when they were passing by, they didn’t even notice him; though most of the time, he didn’t notice them either.

He could still remember that rainy day where R—_Mouri_ forgot an umbrella despite the forecast’s warnings, and one of her club mates just handed her his spare, saying something to her that was out of his earshot, and she _laughed_.

That made a heavy feeling like a punch accompanied by a stab in him when he saw her bright smile, tears beading from joy—_jealous…_

_He was jealous…_ inwardly he chides himself as sternly as possible, he really shouldn’t have stayed so late in the library—he had quit the Soccer Club since the first year of Middle School _as if he was subjecting himself through _that_—_

Cursing he forcefully shoves down on those memories—_why were they coming back up now?!_

“Wait, isn’t that—_Hey Kudou!_” he would forever deny that he _jumped_ in place when he heard that all too familiar voice—though slightly deeper than it used to be, he doesn’t look, instead he ducks down forces his umbrella open—albeit too roughly than he should—before running through the heavy downpour of rain, knowing it would still soak through most of his clothes.

Anything else _Nakamichi_ said was muffled by the loud pattering of the raindrops.

-

He had every intention to keep himself in a separate class as Mouri and Suzuki, however, when he was about to enroll, he was called into a case that involved a serial killer. He was supposed to just pick out something from the crime scene, in case something else stood out to him—but of course, it ended with him encountering the criminal by chance, getting stabbed and landing himself in a hospital.

A quick check told him that Suzuki and Mouri were long enrolled by the time he got out. Whether he was directed to the class above or below theirs, anything works, so long as he wasn’t in the same room as them, nor the class with Nakamichi and his group.

He had been careful in ways of how to properly avoid them by taking that to the extreme and keeping them separated—_it was for the best…_

_…and he promised himself._

The fact that he was one of the last students that enrolled, should’ve landed him on either Class E or F… or even have him go to another institute for there’re no more seats available.

_Of course, it didn’t work that way_.

First day in, he’s late due to a case on the way, and the moment he entered his assigned classroom—he _stopped breathing, freezing in his tracks when his eyes met greyish blue with purple streaks._

He should’ve _known_, he’s been far too lucky all those years.

It didn’t help that this class was the same class his _hell started in_. Nakamichi was in the corner, and Mouri and Suzuki, as usual, had Mouri seated next to the window, with Suzuki behind her. His teacher’s voice snaps him out of his reverie, he apologizes before he goes to the seat in the middle, not too close, not too far.

And he makes sure he doesn’t meet anyone’s eye.

Meeting Mouri’s eyes were enough to give him dread through the whole duration of the class.

…

It hadn’t always been like that.

Shin’ichi remembered _that <strike>fateful</strike> day _when he saw a tearful little Mouri Ran from that window back in pre-school, how she was clearly being bullied by three other kids for one reason or another—one he later figures out as them picking on her for not have her Sakura pin, and instead having a makeshift flower cut-out from paper.

Meaning, they were picking on her for being the only one being different. He arrived at that conclusion when he deduced what she was making with that pink paper in the dark during their nap time.

His mother had always taught him to treat girls right, his father always said as a boy he had to protect them and treat them well. He knew those boys were being mean for no reason other than feeling great for themselves by bullying others, so, he hides his pin and tells her his deductions about the pin.

She had already been crying when she was bullied earlier, no need to draw attention to that—so instead he focuses on the pin. Wondering if it would amaze her like Sherlock did Watson.

Let it not be said that he has the worse filter—he’d never lied when he was doing his mock deduction shows, he usually doesn’t hold back either. So, he called her a crybaby—because she’d been crying too much for him not to honestly say that. And he only realized that crybaby isn’t the nicest word to address someone when she reacted to _not_ being a crybaby.

The rest of the class was amazed, but she wasn’t all too happy with it.

But he knew those bullies wouldn’t let up on her, so it was time for phase 2.

He asked for the pin.

And she… was very _kind_. She just finished that Sakura and she had no qualms giving it to him. She asked for his name before writing it down with a shaky script in hiragana, and she presents it to him with a _smile_.

For once, he understood what his mother meant when she went on and on about romance and first love.

The feeling of warmth, and comfortable weight in your chest, face slightly heating up.

_Having someone smile at him like that, as kind as she is, and like that someone_… he decides… _is a nice feeling_—better than acknowledgment due to amazement.

…

Mouri Ran… didn’t like him too much, maybe it was because he was awfully invested in revealing that that no-good, sorry of an excuse caretaker was in fact not a good person. He was a very bad man who was working on kidnapping her and taking her away, and she hasn’t even realized that! It was so obvious he _had to do something about it_.

So he watched her, kept an eye on that _leery-sleazy man_, made sure to note every single discrepancy in his actions. And he was paying her too much attention, it wasn’t even the normal favoritism—he’d seen how that looked and it was nothing like the way the man looked at Mouri.

He knew that the police wouldn’t take him seriously unless his father backed him up, neither of the kids believed him—even Mouri herself, if anything he just made the other kids _not like him_—and that was fine, Sherlock wasn’t well-liked for being too smart, and comprehending things the others didn’t. He has Watson as a true-friend and Shin’ichi was determined to find the one who’ll become his Watson…

(Plus, his mother said if they couldn’t appreciate you as you are, they are not worthy to be called your friend.)

The next day, he knew was when that _phony_-_teacher_ would do something, so he tried everything to keep him from succeeding, he did tell his parents but his mother didn’t believe him and was more insistent that he was just jealous because _Mouri Ran-chan_ liked the teacher more than she liked him (in fact, if he were to say honestly, he’d say that there was no comparison as Mouri _didn’t like him_). He was too busy trying to convince her to see how his father took it, but there was a chance his father took him seriously, especially since the man didn’t say anything patronizing and in fact asked him questions that he was certain was likely relevant—_maybe_—to an investigation procedure.

When nothing happened and that man disappeared for the rest of the day, the other teachers said he had to leave due to certain circumstances and due to some family emergency—but he knew better.

His father had gone and arrested that man—preventing whatever plot that man had for kidnapping a child—one he knew would never end well according to the statistics he looked up as reference (from when he snuck a peek and read his father’s case files).

The highlight, however, was actually the fact that even though he had been rather rude and mean to her, Mouri still stuck with him and welcomed him as her friend, though Suzuki obviously thought otherwise. Knowing that their parents were actually close since high school.

They too only grew closer…

-

That was until the mid-semester of their second grade class field trip when the victim dropped from the height the killer strung him on while Ran called him as he was too distracted by the dripping blood—one he actually thought was paint—and he was about to rush forward to the gathered group, but the corpse cut his route and basically blocked his way as a splattered mess. That resulted in loud screams, the children’s parents, including his own and the police called to the scene.

That was his first murder case that he was involved in without his father.

…

The aftermath wasn’t as bad, sure, there were traumatized children, but no one really connected the case to him.

It wasn’t until that second case where the class went on an outing a week later to apparently get the student’s mind off the gruesome scene, then the class teacher brought them in to this recently opened, pastel and cartoony-animal themed café that is more than likely intended for teens and children on the way to their destination.

Ran had called for him to get his order while he was looking at the man seating oddly still with an overall poor slouching posture in his seat, heavily dressed in a trench coat, a hat, and sunglasses. He couldn’t help but note that the man hadn’t moved even when his order came, not even a sound of acknowledgment slipped out of his lips. And, of course, a man dressed suspiciously stood out in such pastel-themed café.

Ran had just reached him when she stumbled on her own feet sending her lunging for him and pushing them both back against the stool the man was seated on.

“I-I’m sorry!” she stuttered looking up, and out of concern that the man was going to yell at her, knowing it was an accident, he too looks up and over his shoulder behind him, ready to back her up just in case—only to see the man sway…

…and drop to the floor in a slump.

He stared as silence raged in the café, everyone staring at them—a waitress approached the man, but she must have noticed something, as not even two steps away from the man, she screamed.

And once more the police were called.

It was then that after the case he noticed it, except for Ran and Sonoko, the others had given them a wide berth, grouped together glaring at their direction, and whispering amongst each other—_no_, more like, _glaring fearfully at him_.

-

Things only snowballed down from there.

He would open his locker when class finished only to find it stuffed with either a dead crow, any type of bird, critters, and other small animals—the teachers told him to keep his fascination at home. Someone had thrown his outdoor shoes in the trash, his indoor shoes in the pool—he heard others laughing, but no one really did anything the teachers had tried to let the student who did it to spill, but no one did.

His lunch was dropped and spilled on the floor that he had to clean up, and someone had quite literally kicked a soccer ball to his head in soccer practice.

Both were written off as accidents.

On his desk, someone had vandalized it with a badly written script of: _“Leave us, you demon!”, “The dead should stay dead!”, “Stop spreading your curse around, death spawn!”_

The teacher hadn’t said anything to him, demanded the class, to tell the truth, but got no results, they had to replace his desk when the marker wouldn’t come off.

On the first two days, both Ran and Sonoko had reacted badly, at his prompting they only gave their silent support—they’d get bullied too at this rate, and he knew how bad those get. Two weeks later, when he got back to the room to find his school supplies ripped apart, room void of anyone but himself who had just changed into fresh clothes when someone dumped pond water on him (four of them from the sound of it), bag trashed and cut with scissors, and likely the cutter that is hidden in their teacher’s desk—his things that Ran and Sonoko were supposed to be guarding. And he hopes they aren’t hurt before sighing and cleaning up the mess, properly disposing of the ruined things, not like he could use it anyway.

And he was about to head home when he notes that there were quite a lot of students gathered behind the shed. Out of curiosity, he silently approaches the shed, making sure not to step on anything that would alert anyone to his presence, and there he sees Nakamichi, his group and some of the mean girls in his class gathered around a box (that held an albino baby snake as he later finds out). All laughing and remarking cruelly amongst each other, and in the very back of the group, he sees _Ran and Sonoko_.

“Hey look who decided to come!” _crap_… he forgot that there was that other kid in Nakamichi’s group—_too late_, the larger boy had already pushed him, making him stumble on the ground next to the box where he heard hissing.

Out of habit, he glares up at them—faltering when he sees Ran’s scrunched up face and Sonoko’s glare.

** _“Just so you know, I don’t like you, Kudou Shin’ichi-kun…”_ **

_“What the hell’s wrong with you? Why are you looking at us like that?”_

** _“I’m not a crybaby!”_ **

_“He’s got such a scary face when he’s such a baby! What death?!”_

** _“You’re a stupid meanie!!!”_ **

_“…e’s not listening…”_

He didn’t see the fist coming until it was too late and it had made contact with his cheek. Unprepared, his body staggers back and he hits his head against the handle of the shed’s door, his vision blacking out, and as it dimmed, he sees how the other girls had held both Sonoko and Ran’s hands while they both also held each other’s.

His mind recalling what both Ran and Sonoko has said separately to him in the past when he said something awful and made them upset. Echoing loudly in his head, as if he was hearing it again for the first time…

** _“I hate you!”_ **

And everything went dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **(Here we have alt!Shin’ichi’s backstory!!!**
> 
> Snakes are my new obsession… well, I was already fascinated with them as a kid? But I recently found this YouTube Channel all about snakes and reptiles and it just cranked my obsession to an 11.
> 
> [Kinda out of blue, right? But the order was supposed to be: Ad Nauseam, En Famille, Canon!Shin’ichi’s Interlude, then alt!Shin’ichi’s backstory (one could also consider this as an Interlude, actually)… so, I guess I’ll have to add a timeline in the endnotes for the interludes…]
> 
> Okay this does seem like an OOC behavior from Shin’ichi, but I’m pulling on his trait of not wanting to harm non-criminals and cranking that up to extreme, and _yes,_ I am in fact, aware that bullying is a crime.
> 
> So, I’m also playing on the fact that Shin’ichi tends to try and resolve things on his own without relying on anyone? Also, I’m kinda adding Conan’s mentality into that where he doesn’t say anything to other kids for their behavior as he believes he’s the mature (older) one? And kids don’t really know better? He won’t say anything until they hit an extreme.
> 
> And if you’re saying that those bullying cases aren’t tame, I’ll put it out that I have been bullied, like since Elementary but it stopped on my last year of middle school, the second year middle school—I just harassed them ten-fold, like let their offenses pile up, before returning it all to them a hundredfold near the end of the school year. First-year middle school, I actually became a bully because I didn’t want to be bullied by others. Was even called the Bully of Bullies at that time. (I switched schools a lot, so no one really knew me.)
> 
> My flight-or-fight response is; ignore but not forget, bottle-up, and explode given the right opportunity, or _fight back_. I’m petty and salty, so I would actually make sure they end up worse than the treatment they gave me?
> 
> Quid Pro Quo will be updated sporadically (a.k.a worse than my already sporadic updates). ^^
> 
> **Until the next update!**
> 
> **—DescriptivePessimism-DAA)**


	2. Respect and Love

(Are about the same—respect one’s self and others, and they shall do that same.)

Shin'ichi didn't come home until late that night, and he had to make sure the snake was unharmed—before zipping it up in his zipper pocket, that the guard wasn't paying attention before sneaking out of the campus via climbing on the gate with a splitting headache and a swimming vision. 

From the moon's position, it was likely very late and maybe around or almost midnight. 

His parents would be worried. 

But he walks through the dark silent streets spite his parents’ warnings, the bad feeling in his gut that told him he should have gone up the guard, have the incompetent drunkard call his parents, _and wasn't there a serial child—_

_"Pretty boys like you shouldn't really be out here at this time of night, you know?"_

_Shit. Just. His. Forsaken. Luck._

A sharp reverbing on the back of his head and once again, his vision goes white before he's swallowed in darkness. 

… 

He woke up thrice in his abductor's captivity (technically more than that, but that was just about the times he could remember), feeling worse than he usually does when he was sick and bedridden and it was truly foolish on his part to have tried to go alone in the night when stories of a serial child abductor and killer was on the loose. 

Both of his parents had warned him, he fit the target profile. 

And was thus sternly warned to keep out of the case. This bad man would kidnap children—boys his age, keep them, starve them and do many bad things to them, kill them before dumping them naked in a river for the police and their parents to find. 

He knew his father had left things out, his mother was glaring at the man, and he had intended to sneak in his father's study, but was found on every attempt that he couldn't find out much. 

(He'd always been drawn to his father's study, much to his mother's chagrin—to which she always blamed his father for.) 

He was going to try again to find out more the night he was taken, but apparently, he didn't need to. 

As the suspect went and decided he would be the next victim. 

He doesn't remember much during his captivity, but he does remember waking up tied next to a boy a bit larger than him, so likely a year older—alive, relatively unharmed, but bound and frightened, even though he tried not to be—who introduced himself as brightly as he could, but Shin'ichi lost consciousness soon after he says—_promises_—to the other kid that they would be fine, that his father would find them. 

**_"So will my dad! And let me tell you! He will make the criminal regret this! By the way…"_**

He doesn't say anything to refute the boy's claims, nothing about how they would be either the ninth or tenth victim by the time the suspect's through with them, depending on who goes first. That this man has been elusive all this time, that there's no guarantee he'll be caught, if at all. 

Not that he could tell him anyway. 

\- 

The second time he woke up, the other boy was more subdued, clearly tired and the man was likely not feeding him, they made eye contact but he doesn't stay conscious enough to understand what the other said next nor comprehend what he saw. 

He's certain that the other boy had pretty eyes though... 

A very unique color, which is a shame... the culprit did have the tendency to gouge out his victims' eyes to keep as trophies—then again, maybe that's exactly why he did it. 

Pretty vibrant eye colors compared to the common black, gray and hazel. After all, only around 20% of the population has the colors near the green to blue spectrum, and on average; most people meet at least five people in their life, bearing those said colored eyes. 

Take Ran, for example, one wouldn't see the purple-ish tint to her grey eyes if one didn't look close enough. A perfect mix of both her parents, Kogorou had the dark grey pair while her mother had the more purple-tinted blue. 

Much like the first time he woke up though, he quickly lost consciousness after that. 

\- 

Shin'ichi wakes up for the third time, and the boy was patting him worriedly, and holding a cool glass of water to his lips, begging him to drink, and the moonlight that streamed through the gaps of the boarded window showed him enough and confirmed that the other’s eyes were actually a pair of blues that held a purple tint much like Ran’s only it was clearly even more vibrant and had less greys—if not at all.

He parts his lips and allows the boy to assist him dri—_why are they unbound?_

He tries to open his eyes to take in as much of the room as he could, even though the room blurred out of his field vision. As if it was only them in the room.

“Where’s…” he tries to ask—abductors’ tend not to leave their captives unbound in a room for long periods of time. The boy shakes his head, shushing him.

“Shh, I just managed to cut the rope, there’s a loose vent latch, and I’m pretty sure it leads outside—it’s been two days, do you think you can move? He gave me a plate of food yesterday—but you wouldn’t wake up, do you think you can eat?”

_No_… he doesn’t think he can stomach anything, _his stomach and head hurt, and the room feels like it’s spinning all around him, making him feel nauseous._

He likely won’t be able to keep it down, he wants to shake his head, but he thinks that’s a bad idea, the room already felt like it was spinning—shaking his head would just make it feel worse.

Closing his eyes, he mumbles his response as audibly as he could. The boy keeps touching him as if trying to gain his attention and keep him awake—and feeling light-headed as he did, he was likely feeling the effects of dehydration, starvation and the concussion.

“Hey… I don’t think you’re supposed to sleep that much, your head was bleeding—so you might be hurt and mom says having your head hurt is bad. Hey… stay with me, I already…” his voice muffled out, but came back after a while. “… out and get help…” the boy trails off, worry evident in his voice.

“Hey… _please_… you can’t sleep, you need to stay with me, com’on…” the other was really trying to keep his voice down, but there was a whine and Shin’ichi moaned—the other kid was about to cry. He can’t have that, in this situation, it would be best if the other boy got out on his own and get help.

“Go ahead… get help, and bring the police here…” he tries to get a look at the other boy only to see the worried frown on the other’s features. “… you go ahead… I’ll catch up, we’ll run, get away, call the police.” Shin’ichi moves his hands and finds them cooperating with him, finally—now, for the vent—_there_. He does his best to crawl across the room towards it, and the other helps him. They both just reached the latch, and the other boy had pried it open.

“Are you certain it leads outside?” he asks, and he mentally frowns at how he was practically slurring and gasping it out.

“Yes, there’s only a little crawlspace, and below are a bunch of garbage bags that would cushion our fall…”

_So, they’re likely on the second floor_. But nonetheless, he hums an affirmative.

“You go ahead,” the other boy looks like he’s about to complain, but Shin’ichi hurriedly cuts in to rationalize with him, “If I go first I m-might end up retching and won’t be able to move out of the way. I’d need help to get up, so you would need to be already down there when I fall. And I likely won’t be able to fall properly and I might hit my head—” he didn’t even need to go on, as the boy had paled and was nodding vigorously. And was immediately crawling through the crawlspace, and he hears the thump when the boy landed, looking around, he ducks down to crawl through the space. Trying to keep his movements silent, and wind hit his hair, looking down he makes eye contact with the messy-haired boy down below—

—There was_ something_ odd about that very scene though… _something _that gave him a sense of familiarity.

Shaking his head, he pulls himself through and braces himself for the fall.

Either the boy had great reflexes, or his luck was thousand times better than his own—as his upper torso just came in contact with the boy’s hands, which honestly cushioned the fall, but sent both of them sprawling on the ground.

_The culprit woke up_.

The other boy didn’t waste a second, he sprung up and pulled him along to run. Even though his head complained, he tried to push through.

-

The rest of that night had become a blur, they were only able to run for a while, before the suspect caught up to them, easily plucking them off the ground, throwing them over his shoulder as he dragged them back to the abandoned house. Arrogantly laughing how no one would find them until it was too late.

No one had found him before, why should they now?

Shin’ichi felt the headache hammer him into unconsciousness after that.

…

The fourth time he woke up, he found that he was alone (_Where was the other boy? Was he okay?_) and on his back on a flat surface—and from the emanating sensation, he was stripped down to his boxers—_someone was touching him_…

Forcing his eyes open, he tries to get a glimpse of the smirking man on top of him, he tries to protest, but he only manages to croak out choked off sounds, rasping like a broken record that was reduced to a few syllabic gibberish mess.

_He didn’t want this… _

The man makes a vaguely pleased sound, as he rubbed the skin on his cheek staring right into his eyes before continuing down to caress his skin, while the man’s other hand reached for something and something glinted in his peripheral.

_A knife…_

_… and_ it was heading towards his stomach, the blade stinging upon contact with his skin, blood trailing down from the fresh cuts.

_Is this it? He didn’t want to die… _

He tries to glare at the man, but, _of course_, that only served to further amuse him, and…

_He wanted to go home!_

Someone had screamed—it took him a while to realize it was him, as the knife dug deeper and _deeper._

When the man decided to move to other portions of his skin, carving some weird curvy patterns—

Something crashed from afar, and he hears the man growl then he was _gone_… and in his place, he saw someone who looked an awful lot like his father, just minus the glasses and stylized mustache, but the darkness swallows him once more.

…

He wakes up to the scent of antibiotics and sterile air—_hospital then_.

He tries to get up, but his body felt awfully like lead, he hears a gasp and soon his mother’s teary face comes in view.

That’s when he learns that he was nearly bled to death, while the other boy was knocked out with a blow to the head that resulted in a concussion. Aside from a few days’ starvations, dehydration, not to mention his concussion that was already there, they were otherwise fine—of course, except for the obvious.

They’ve been in captive for _nearly_ four days—until his father and the other boy’s father found them, and that the other man was the one who found him first, knocked out the criminal and performed first aid to let the paramedics handle him. And he had apparently been unconscious for most of his recovery, temporarily waking up but incoherent and on heavy medication that he didn’t make much sense for the first few days.

Everyone had assured him that he was and _will be fine_.

(He knew that whatever pattern that criminal carved on his skin would be permanent.)

Three days later, he had to answer to the questions of the police, and another three days later he was released, but to be bedridden.

…

His parents must have found out about the bullying, as when he was certain he recovered enough to be able to go to school, just without over-exerting himself—_more than recovered actually, aside from feeling sore in all sorts of places_—that they both informed him that he was to be homeschooled. _Just to be sure he’s fully recovered and wouldn’t risk his injuries reopening_.

While some of the cuts were actually deep enough to risk them tearing open, he also knew how much of an excuse it was when he’s mother said that to him with her wavering voice. _It was obvious_.

His father’s tight expression and sigh confirmed things for him even further.

He, however, wasn’t going to complain—he didn’t think he’ll be able to look at anyone’s face again, especially since the other kids had decided to keep Ran and Sonoko away—and should he still even call them by their first names? He’s pretty sure that only works for close friends.

And Ran had promised, Sonoko silently backing her, when he was going to change his clothes—that they would watch over his things and—_no_, he really can’t blame it on them.

With how much trouble he gets into, or if not, it finds him, he really can’t blame them for being sick of putting up with him.

On that note, he just hopes his parents wouldn’t full out homeschool him for the rest of his years.

…

Cursing mentally when his eraser dropped on the floor, slipping through the gap—_he really should buy a new pouch, and stop putting his scissors and cutters in one place_—then _rolling on the floor_, what has he done to deserve this?

And he ducks low to reach for it, already aiming to stop it in its path, only for it to stop rolling when it bumped into an indoor shoe that just stepped in front of him—black knee-length socks, a female then—_no time._

“Excuse me…” it probably was rude to mutter that almost inaudibly, but he doesn’t care—he’s certain they wouldn’t either. Grabbing his eraser—and this will be the last time he buys the cylindrical ones—he stuffs that in his bag, doesn’t look at the girl that stepped in front of him, keeping his eyes low and head bowed, before sprinting out of the classroom and towards the shoe lockers.

He swore someone tried to call him again, but he ignores all of that, kicking into his shoes before immediately getting out of the campus.

-

In their last year of Middle School when he ignored them during that rainy day, they hadn’t tried to make any contact, and it seems they were trying again—however he knew this will be the only time they will try and attempt to reach out to him.

After all, even in America, _nothing_ changed, in fact, the kids there were even worse compared to the ones here in Japan. Something as insignificant as friendship is not worth it.

As his mother said, if they don’t appreciate him as he is, they are not worth the effort. He doesn’t need friends, it’s not like he’s completely isolated after all, maybe just with his peers, but that was fine—it’s not like he spends the whole time in class anyways.

His phone rings, as if to support his mental claim, smiling at Megure’s contact, he answers the call.

“Yes? Kudou Shin’ichi speaking.”

**|End|**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **(****I really apologize... **but just him having a _“making-friend-phobia”_ wasn't enough for me apparently... TTwTT
> 
> And as I’m re-watching the sixth Detective Conan TV Special: The Shrunken Great Detective (you know, the rendition of episode one and some other episodes) I’m mourning how aside from their first meeting, and time spent together beyond their elementary level is gone—like I’m watching it, and in my head the scenes are breaking apart like broken glass for the lost opportunity…
> 
> Damn…
> 
> Do I regret it though? (_Nope~ _^w^)
> 
> Also… I just realized but this should actually be in the Mature edition just for the content right there… oh well, too late now~
> 
> As much as I kinda wanna make the serial killer a pedophile (to make the most despicable criminal in existence)? That’s just too much now, I wanna keep this under DCMK Revisions, and not under the Mature Edition, so, he’ll just be a bad, bad man, who has a thing for carving up boys—which I don’t actually see how that’s any better. ^^”
> 
> **Until the next update!**
> 
> **—DescriptivePessimism-DAA)**


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